Completion of bypass pleases some in Nelsonville, worries others

Sunday

Sep 22, 2013 at 12:01 AMSep 22, 2013 at 3:17 PM

NELSONVILLE, Ohio - With the completion of the Rt. 33 Nelsonville bypass within sight, residents and business owners wonder what effect the new highway will have on the downtown commercial district. The highway, scheduled to open on Oct. 1, is to cut an estimated 20 minutes from the trip between Columbus and Athens. But some of the city's nearly 5,400 residents fear that the business district will wither when through traffic is diverted onto the new highway and vehicles no longer are forced to idle outside gas stations, fast-food restaurants and other retailers along Canal Street, the current Rt. 33.

Mary Beth Lane, The Columbus Dispatch

NELSONVILLE, Ohio — With the completion of the Rt. 33 Nelsonville bypass within sight, residents and business owners wonder what effect the new highway will have on the downtown commercial district.

The highway, scheduled to open on Oct. 1, is to cut an estimated 20 minutes from the trip between Columbus and Athens. But some of the city’s nearly 5,400 residents fear that the business district will wither when through traffic is diverted onto the new highway and vehicles no longer are forced to idle outside gas stations, fast-food restaurants and other retailers along Canal Street, the current Rt. 33.

“We don’t have much here, but what we have, I hope we don’t lose,” retiree Joe Grose said.

Others predict a rebirth in Nelsonville when the tractor-trailers clear from Canal Street. The historic Public Square continues its revival, with new shops occupying old brick buildings. City officials recently removed parking meters from the square to encourage more visitors.

“I feel it’s going to help make Nelsonville a destination, a safer, more-accessible community,” said Jennifer L’Heureux, whose Nelsonville Emporium occupies a renovated former department store on the square.

The Nelsonville bypass is the final leg of the Ohio Department of Transportation’s work to transform Rt. 33 between Franklin County and the Ohio River into a modern road resembling an interstate highway. The improved transportation corridor is intended to aid economic development in Appalachian Ohio, historically the state’s most-impoverished region.

The 12-mile Lancaster bypass opened in 2005. Business owners along Lancaster’s Memorial Drive, the busy local stretch of Rt. 33, initially worried that the bypass would dry up commerce. Their fears proved unfounded, however. More businesses and a new shopping development have sprung up there since the bypass was built around the city of nearly 40,000 residents.

“You can’t compare Lancaster to Nelsonville,” Grose said. “The bypass didn’t hurt Lancaster at all. But it’s altogether different up there from what we have down here.”

The Nelsonville bypass cost about $200 million to build. That includes $150 million in federal stimulus funds that rescued the project when it threatened to stall.

Most of the 8.5-mile bypass runs through the Wayne National Forest, Ohio’s only national forest. ODOT officials worked with federal forestry officials to exceed the usual environmental regulations governing road-building, said department spokesman David Rose.

The wildlife protection includes 8-foot-high fences along the bypass so deer cannot run across the highway and cause crashes. For deer that wander onto the highway anyway, 16 openings in the fencing are designed to funnel them back into the forest.

About 12,000 feet of snake fence also are included. The low, mesh fencing is designed to protect the endangered timber rattlesnake. The fencing has a folded lip on top so snakes can’t wriggle over it. Instead, the rattlesnakes are to cross the highway through one of the

tunnel-like culverts running underneath the four traffic lanes.

Larger culverts beneath the road also are designed to accommodate deer and other forest animals crossing the highway. The culverts have bat boxes on their ceilings for Indiana bats, another endangered species in the forest.

Another culvert crossing beneath the highway was built for all-terrain-vehicle operators using the forest trail.

The wildlife-protection features account for about $10 million of the total cost. It is the price of building a highway through a national forest while protecting endangered species, Rose said.

Anticipation is running high among travelers. Rose said he answers calls regularly from people asking when the bypass will open. Everyone from Ohio University students and their parents to vacationers driving south to the seacoast wants to know.

The western leg opened last year, giving drivers a taste of the bypass. Wanda Johnson, who lives on Canal Street and owns C and W Custom Framing near Public Square, is among the drivers who have remarked how beautiful the bypass is.

“It actually ties Nelsonville into the beautiful forest here. Maybe that is a positive,” Johnson said.

Johnson said she believes that the highway will reduce business at Canal Street’s fast-food restaurants and gas stations but won’t affect businesses such as hers that serve locals.

Mike Spencer, who has been repairing autos for 32 years at his Nelsonville Car Care, said his business will be fine, too. About 90 percent of his customers are local, and the rest are students from OU or Hocking College in Nelsonville.

“It can’t open up quick enough,” Spencer said. “You can spend a half-hour getting through this town.”

Grose, whose hillside home overlooks the sight of customer traffic pulling into and out of the local McDonald’s, worries that the image will fade like an old photo when the highway bypasses Nelsonville.

The retired ODOT foreman said he supports the transformation of the

Rt. 33 corridor into an interstate look-alike, yet he is apprehensive about what it will mean for his community.

“It’s going to be quiet,” he said. “I guess that’s the price of progress.”

mlane@dispatch.com

@MaryBethLane1

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